ASMCUE2009

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Online supplementary instruction via Blackboard to build the knowledge base of pre-Nursing students to succed

M. Tawde and A. Nguyen, Queensborough Community College, Bayside, NY.

Abstract

We wanted to ask whether an online supplementary tutorial will better prepare the students by building their Biology knowledge base necessary to succeed in the prenursing classes- Human Anatomy-Physiology – I and II and General Microbiology. The enrollment for these classes is pretty heavy; however as community coleege students the are diverse in their educational backgrounds and preparation levels; many students lack training in Science- especially in Biology while many are the returning students, who haven’t been to school for a long time. These students are overwhelmed by the depth and immensity of the material presented in above classes. This leads to high atrition rate. To help improve student retention in these classes, We developed an online Blackboard site with the supplementary modules which may help students understannd and retain the knowledge better. Topics are presented in form of visuals or animations which include -1.Prokaryotic and Eukaryotic Cell- the plant, animal and bacterial cell structures and their Functions, Microscope parts/function etc. 2. Elements and chemical reactions; chemical interactions between biomolecules; 3.Cell structure -cell membrane and organelles We haven't started collecting data yet but plan to collect data pre-test and post-test. The. post-test data points i.e. the grades of exams that would cover above modules will be collected at the end of Spring '09 semester. For Pre-test data points we will use the exam grades from the same instructor's class before the website was put up. Three lecture sections and three lab sections are selected, and students will be tracked during the course of the semester to determine BB site usage. In particular, students that have never used the site will be compared with students that use the site on a regular basis. We already know from tracking student usage of A&P II Blackboard site, that approximately 75% of the students visit the site at least once during the semester, and approximately 30% of the students visit on a regular basis. Since we know that about 30% of the students will use the supplemental instruction and others will not, we hope to establish in each class a population of students that does and does not use supplemental instruction thus providing us some internal controls. Affective and Cognitive learning tracked by surveys- such as SALG and/or SENCER SALG.

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Hi Mangala, You have an interesting project here and I'll look forward to seeing your poster and discussing your BB modules. The abstract describes what you did well enough, though there are several typo's, including in the title, which are distracting. One point that I am confused on is the pre and post test comparison. Are these done for the same student cohort, because your sentence reads to me like it refers to 2 different cohorts, in which case this is not really a pre and post test, but rather two groups from different years. If you are able to do so then I would suggest adding the pre test data in now.

Hi Mangala: Did you know your abstract is over 2500 characters, with spaces? The limit is 1850, so I am going to focus my suggestions on things you can remove.

Perhaps simplify the section that reads...

"The enrollment for these classes is pretty heavy; however as community coleege students the are diverse in their educational backgrounds and preparation levels; many students lack training in Science- especially in Biology while many are the returning students, who haven’t been to school for a long time. These students are overwhelmed by the depth and immensity of the material presented in above classes. This leads to high atrition rate."

...to read:
"For multiple reasons, many students in these courses are underprepared and overwhelmed, leading to a high attrition rate."

The details on why they are underprepared can wait for the poster.

Also, although you haven't started collecting data, you will have by the time this poster abstract is printed. I would leave out the part were you mention, "We haven't started collecting data yet but plan to collect data pre-test and post-test." Write it instead as if you have collected this data. Don't lie -- don't make up data -- but describe what you have done as if you have already done it (because by May you will have!). That means the voice needs to be changed to past tense. Including pre-test data will be helpful, if you have it in time.